No More Sanctions, No More War

As we approach the centennial of World War I, we will read much of the blunders that produced that tragedy of Western civilization.

Among them will be the “blank check” Kaiser Wilhelm II gave to Vienna after the assassination by a Serb terrorist of the Austrian Archduke Francis Ferdinand.

If you decide to punish the Serbs, said the Kaiser, we are with you.

After dithering for weeks, Austria shelled Belgrade. Within a week, Germany and Austria were at war with Russia, France and Great Britain.

Today the Senate is about to vote Israel a virtual blank check—for war on Iran. Reads Senate bill S.1881: If Israel is “compelled to take military action in legitimate self-defense against Iran’s nuclear weapons program,” the United States “should stand with Israel and provide … diplomatic, military and economic support to the Government of Israel in the defense of its territory, people and existence.”

Inserted in that call for U.S. military action to support an Israeli strike on Iran, S.1881 says that, in doing so, we should follow our laws and constitutional procedures.

Nevertheless, this bill virtually hands over the decision on war to Bibi Netanyahu who is on record saying: “This is 1938. Iran is Germany.”

Is this the man we want deciding whether America fights her fifth war in a generation in the Mideast? Do we really want to outsource the decision on war in the Persian Gulf, the gas station of the world, to a Likud regime whose leaders routinely compare Iran to Nazi Germany?

The bill repeatedly asserts that Iran has a “nuclear weapons program.”

Yet in both 2007 and 2011, U.S. intelligence declared “with high confidence” that Iran does not have a nuclear weapons program.

Where is the Senate’s evidence for its claim? Why has Director of National Intelligence James Clapper not been called to testify as to whether Tehran has made the decision to go for a bomb?

Why are the American people being kept in the dark?

Are we being as misled, deceived, and lied to about Iran’s “weapons of mass destruction,” as we were about Iraq’s?

The bill says that in a final deal Iran must give up all enrichment of uranium. However, we have already been put on notice by President Hassan Rouhani that this is an ultimatum Iran cannot accept.

Even the reformers of Iran’s Green Revolution of 2009 back their country’s right to a peaceful nuclear program including enrichment.

Senate bill S.1881 imposes new sanctions if Iran fails to live up to the interim agreement or fails to come to a final agreement in six months.

Yet the Senate knows that Iran has warned that if new sanctions are voted during negotiations, they will walk away from the table.

Why is the Senate risking, or even inviting, a blowup in these talks?

When the interim agreement was reached, it was denounced by neocons as “worse than Munich.” Now the War Party piously contends this Senate bill is simply an “insurance policy” to ensure that the terms of the deal are met and a final deal reached.

It is nothing of the sort. This bill is a project of AIPAC, the Israeli lobby, designed to sabotage and scuttle the Geneva talks by telling Tehran: Either capitulate and dismantle all your enrichment facilities, or face more severe sanctions which will put us on the road to war.

What terrifies AIPAC and Bibi is not an American war on Iran, but an American rapprochement with Iran.

Who are the leaders of the push for S.1881? Sens. Mark Kirk and Robert Menendez, the biggest recipients of AIPAC campaign cash.

Last weekend, the Obama National Security Council finally belled the cat with a blunt statement by spokesperson Bernadette Meehan: “If certain members of Congress want the United States to take military action [against Iran], they should be up front with the American public and say so.”

Exactly. For whether or not all these senators understand what they are doing, this is where their bill points—to a scuttling of the Geneva talks and a return to the sanctions road, at the end of which lies a U.S. war with Iran.

A majority of Democratic senators have thus far bravely bucked AIPAC and declined to co-sponsor S.1881. However, all but two Republican senators have signed on.

If, after Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya, the GOP has once again caught the war fever, the party should be quarantined from the White House for another four years.

Press Secretary Jay Carney says that if S.1881 passes, Obama will veto it. The president should tell Congress that not only will he veto it, but that if Israel decides on its own to attack Iran, Israel will be on its own in the subsequent war.

Obama should order U.S. intelligence to tell us the truth.

Is Iran truly hell-bent on acquiring a nuclear bomb? Does Iran have a nuclear bomb program? If so, when did Tehran make that decision?

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19 Responses to No More Sanctions, No More War

Not only should Obama veto this monstrosity, if it should pass, but even if the veto is overridden, he should ignore it. If Congress wants to declare war on Iran, so be it, otherwise the President should rely on his executive power viz a viz foreign relations and his status as C in C of the military to take no such actions as the bill calls for. Let Congress sue him, or institute impeachment proceedings, if it dares.

Moreover, Obama should announce publicly and forthrightly, to the American people, to Iran, and to the world, that he has no intention of complying with this made in AIPAC bill, if it somehow does become law. Perhaps that will help keep the peace, despite the best efforts of the Likud party war mongers masquerading as Democratic and Republican Congressmen and Senators of the United States of America.

Before now with this business, remember what an allegedly grave bit of anti-semitism it was to accuse Israel of trying to get us into a war?

Now that it’s undeniable though, doesn’t that make this a grave sin on its part?

Ach though, my prediction is that the hasbara in the wake of this will handle it somehow. It always does. For all its care of validity might even take the form of that expressed in the wake of the U.S.S. Liberty incident. E.g.:

“NO! Of *course* Israel would *never* do any such thing intentionally! It was just an unfortunate little mistake! The U.S. Congress and Obama weren’t flying the Stars and Stripes! It was *cloudy* outside the Capital when AIPAC crashed into it! And the White House resembled just an old Egyptian cattle-transport, and shouldn’t have been where it was in the first place! Only vicious anti-semites would even *suggest* Israel would *intentionally* try to get the U.S. into war!”

I’m done with grumbling about “Why does the Republican party still do this?” I still grumble about the Democrats but at least they can be scared off when you shine a light on them.

I’m tempted to push them forward in this as a test on the American people. Go ahead and vote to push it. Pass it through the house. Rage at the Democrats who don’t follow through. Vilify Obama for vetoing it. Put up speeches and ads and have the SuperPACs post it everywhere. Push it like Iraq again.

The question: if we were faced with another push for war like we were for the Iraq war, in the same way, would the public support it again?

Syria is a good sign of that being no, but it wasn’t pushed hard enough, not in a “do this or they’ll get your family” way.

Lets settle it once and for all, at least in the public square. If the public will support another war, then let’s stop playing games and go in and watch the fireworks. If the public rejects it, it’ll drive a stake through the heart of the ‘War on Terror’.

The irony of this, is that Israel has nuclear weapons, lots of them. Israel is not defenseless. Does Israel really think that Iran will try to nuke Israel, once it develops its first nuke? The Iranians are fond of bellicose rhetoric, but I seriously doubt that they will try to start a nuclear war that they cannot win.

Completely agree with philadelphialawyer. If Kirk & Menendez et al want war with Iran, let them say so to an American public that is sick of pointless wars. If they’re not willing to do so, preferably while holding their bags of AIPAC/Likud cash in front of the news cameras, they can bugger off. Resisting this insane push for war is how Obama is justifying his Nobel prize.

When the Czar’s spy network was ordd to find out if there were any hidden japanese torpedo boats lying in ambush for his fleet in the Skaggerak, they found loads of them. [ wholy imaginary ones,of course ]

We had the same thing regarding one of Iran’s neighbours hidden dangerous programs.
[ lots of evidence of imaginary activities were found ]

I don’t believe Iran is up to something, and if some intel-chief testified otherwise, I still would be utterly unpersuaded.

Just when you think the GOP can’t get any more slavish in their devotion to Israeli interests, they sign on to this bill.

But watch Obama folks. As recently as a few months ago, he told the nation that “only Assad” had access to chemical weapons. That was a lie. Obama is a con man. Never forget this.

What might happen is this. They may make superficial language changes to the bill that don’t alter the substance. Obama will then claim his concerns were met and support or sign a bill with essentially the same substance.

Something has got to be done about AIPAC and the Israel’s Amen Corner.

If Iran wants they bomb, they’ll get the bomb….and there’s nothing anybody could do about it. Sure, Israel could try to hit every Iranian enrichment facility…but then what? Iran opts out of the NPT, kicks out the IAEA inspectors, sets off a few untraceable car bombs in middle America and builds nukes in secret…because they know, (even if you don’t), that nuclear armed nations don’t get bombed. In fact, they don’t even get threatened with bombs.

Are you really so naive to think that attacks on Iran would destroy every nuclear facility and all knowledge of how to build a bomb? It’s 70 year old tech….anybody with google can come up with the plans.

It’s nuts to think the west could bomb every Iranian hole in the ground big enough to hold an enrichment facility. The intelligence might of the west took over half a decade to find bin Laden as he was hiding in plain sight in a Pakistani suburb….disguised with a cowboy hat. Gee…I bet a 6’5″ guy in robes and a cowboy hat never stood out at all in Abadabad.

The sanctions were fading anyway. Russia, China and India, (accounting for half of the global population), had announced increased trade with Iran before this interim agreement was even negotiated, to the tune of tens of billions of dollars. The vast majority of countries in the world back Iran, not the US and they are getting a bit sick and tired of being lectured and bullied by Washington and Tel Aviv.

Almost every cash strapped EU country is lining up to send trade missions to Iran…and there are calls for a permanent EU trade mission there.

So the US has a choice; keep talking with Iran or get left behind. Sure, they have the attack option but before they use it, they should think very carefully how vulnerable most of America is. Oklahoma City proved that you don’t need an airforce to cause devestation…just a rental van and fertilizer.

The US will be left behind. We have no money, and we’re war weary, these neocons blew their chance with Iraq. And everyone knows a war with Iran will make Iraq look like Granada.

Thanks Pat. It’s not at all surprising that Republican Senators are trying to sabotage the Administration’s diplomatic initiatives. If Obama wanted a sunny day they would oppose it. How do we explain the Democrats who defy their own president in deference to Bibi and the MIC? It’s treason and it’s a bipartisan project.

To impose more sanctions at this point is a stupid strategy. Iran is willing to talk and it seems that the US holds all the cards so why give up an opportunity by proposing even more sanctions. I agree that you must confirm first if they are serious and the US needs to be strict with the Iranians by setting up a time table but given them more sanctions is really going to undermine the purpose of coming up with a deal.

Yes, I’m very cynical about this stuff. But there is a tiny bit of hope. Here’s why:

1.) Americans are feeling very, very untrusting of Washington, and still feel particuarly burned by Iraq. The GOP machine may believe they should take the extremist-partisan position of denying the disaster of Iraq and doubling down in Iran, but that is because they only listen to their base, which is an extremist-partisan one. The average American, including most on the right, have the common sense to realize what a catastrophe that stupid war was. Which leads me to…

2. Americans’ rejection of Obama’s attempt to blunder into Syria. Even though he clearly did not have his heart in it, and promised to make only the teensiest, tiniest strike on Damascus, I was surprised at how broad the dissent was, and I believe many Washington politicians were too. Mainstream Dems fought against Obama, and even Tea Partiers were able to come up with thoughtful reasons why a Syria adventure was a bad idea (aside from the fact that it was Obama who proposed it).

Iraq has changed the American electorate in regard to foreign adventures, whether or not the politicians have figured that out yet.

Especially if Obama points out that this bill in essence hands over US foreign policy to a foreign power, it’s not going to be such an easy waltz to another war.

What’s a prolifer to do? One political party wants to kill babies and the other Muslims. Pat is 75 and Ron Paul is probably older. Hopefully, some young leaders will come along and help restore some sanity.